Why were you born
by Secretlypsychotic
Summary: Answering the toughest questions in life is often difficult, but the answers are surprisingly simple. Set before, during and after the movie. Rated K for now but rating may go up. R&R if you like.
1. Chapter 1

**Ok...I jumped on the bandwagon. This is going to be fun to write and to get my writing juices flowing again. Coraline and all related characters...blah, blah, blah....don't own....blah, blah.**

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A twist of the wrench here, a new bike chain there and a dab of oil to go should be just about do it and...done. He stepped back to admire his improved bike. It had taken a lot of time and effort, but his bike was nearly completed. He had spent weeks on his breaks and wheels alone, canabalizing an old trucks wheel parts and placing them on his bike. He had been given his grandfathers old bike nearly six months ago and the first thing he did with it was take it apart and start rebuilding it into his own image. Slowly, but surely the bike was coming together.

"Wybourne! Come inside and get your breakfast!" his grandmother called out to him. He silently obeyed his grandmother and walked toward the house. Wyborn Lovat, preferring 'Wybie', was....an unusual child, to say the least. He always wore the same fading black water-prof trench coat that had reflective strips sewed onto them, jeans that where always rolled up too high at uneven lengths and black gloves with rubber skeleton hand bones on top. His shoes were well worn and falling apart, which was fine with him, as it made it all the easier to climb up things without having to deal with stiff soles. His posture wasn't the best, as he slouched all the time, mostly due to the simple fact that he was a hunchback. Not Quasimodo hunchback...but just enough to have people notice it, making him nervous and shy, and when he got nervous, he stuttered...a lot...even with loved ones he had the stutter.

He loved to run around exploring every last inch of everything, learning about how things worked and how he could make it better. He would spend every free moment either running around the woods, finding the local wildlife and studying it or tinkering with old abandoned junk ripping it apart to see what it looked like on the inside. Because of his passions, he really didn't have many friends, in fact, he didn't have any friends. Sure every now and again he would try to strike up a conversation with the kids at school or even grownups, (stuttering all the while) but the kid's or grownup's replies always felt forced, and they themselves acted uncomfortable. That was ok to Wybie though, he always had his grandma to talk to, at least that's what he told himself.

As he causally walked up to the house, his grandmother who was still in her nightgown and robe, stood in the doorway with her hands on her hips and a slight scowl on her face.

"Honestly Wyborn," she sighed out, "every mornin' you're out there fixin' up that _once_ perfectly good bike of yours or running around before dawn and every mornin' I about have a heart-attack from the noise you make or the empty bed I find...."

"Sorry grandma," he said walking past her, "I'll try to be more quiet."

"Lord knows that one of these days," she continued on, "that the day you really have been kidnaped, I won't do a thing about it because I'll be assumin' you're out running around getting dirty and catching things to put in your pockets, and what then Wyborn, what then?"

Wybie didn't answer his grandma, as this conversation took place every morning, with slight variations to the wording. His grandma shuffled toward the counter top and continued muttering to herself on how one day he was going to break his neck in the woods and he would be dead by the time she noticed that he was gone and other horrible things that were dramatic. She placed his breakfast in front of him which was: bacon and eggs, hash browns, toast, orange juice and chocolate milk. He thanked his grandma and picked up his fork and started to poke at the eggs and hash browns as his grandma rounded the table and sat opposite of him and picked up her tea and stated to sip at it while reading the morning paper.

"Did you finish your homework last night Wyborn?"

"Yes." he said with bits of egg flying out of his mouth.

"Don't talk with your mouth full Wyborn." she said without looking up from the paper. He grunted in reply. Swallowing the food in his mouth, he cleared his throat and asked:

"S-So, what are you going to d-do today, grandma?" he asked, hoping she was going out and he would have the house to himself. She glanced up from her newspaper at him, then looked back down at the paper and said:

"I might go into town if the weather is favorable, but the way my bones feel, it's going to rain."

Wybie sighed, slightly disappointed that he wouldn't have the house to himself, he rarely did, with his grandma retired and all.

"And you, Wyborn," she said lowering the paper and looking at him with a bit of hope on her face, "are you goin' to go to a friends house after school or..."

"N-No," he said very quickly, "I mi-might go to the library and...p-possibly stay after school and do extra h-homework...j-just g-get a h-h-head of class..." he quickly shoved food into his mouth and looked away.

"Hon...there's only two weeks of school left; you're already gettin' strait As." she said lovingly lowering the newspaper; she could tell she had upset him as his stutter became more pronounced. He slightly nodded his head while continuing to chew his food. After several tense minutes of quiet paper rustling and utensil clanking, Wybie finally broke the silence.

"I talked to Mr. Hood a couple of days ago grandma," he said nervously, scratching the top of the table.

"And," she said looking at him, half knowing what he was going to say. Her looking at him over the newspaper made him all the more nervous and his stutter returned.

"W-W-Well, uh, he s-said...th-that he had a...a spare scooter m-motor...and...w-well," his nerve gave out and he looked away and took another bite of food. She smiled slightly.

"Alright Wyborn," she said trying her best to sound annoyed but failed, "if he says you can have it, then yes, you can have it." Wybie's eyes darted back at his grandmas face with total shock in them, quickly replaced with excitement.

"Y-You really mean it, grandma?" he asked, his is crooked smile spreading across his face.

"Yes Wyborn," she said sighing while turning a page of the newspaper, "as long as you keep it out of the house." He grinned all the more and quickly finished his breakfast, then hurried up to his room to get ready for school. She couldn't help but to chuckle at this. She knew what he wanted to do with the motor, and in all good graces she was against it, but she knew what would make him happy. But then her smile faded, knowing that it would only temporarily fix his loneliness. She got up and started to clean up the dishes and put them in the sink to handwash them later. She then shuffled into the living room and put on her slippers and shawl then found her purse and was in the middle of digging out her car keys when Wybie was running (to her, it sounded like falling) down the stairs. He had changed out of his coat, jeans and old shoes and into his school uniform.

The school uniforms were grey coats with grey pants and white shirts, boring as nothing else. His uniform was the only thing that he owned that didn't have a grease stain or a rip in them, he only wore it to school and even if he didn't have to, he wouldn't ware them at all. He always contemplated on using them as grease rags once he was out of school. His grandma shuffled over to him, fixing his collar and straitening his jacket. She went to adjust his hair but any attempts to do so would run the risk of having her hand entangled within.

"Wyborn," she sighed, "you really need to brush your hair."

"I do," he said with a smirk, "but the brush gets sucked in. Besides, my hair is naturally messy." She sighed and shook her head.

"Come on then," she sighed while turning towards the door, "if we don't hurry, you'll be late for school."

"Don't worry grandma," he pipped up, "once my bike is finished, you won't have to take me to school anymore."

"Then how will I know you get there on time," she said climbing into the car, "or that you're not playin' hookie."

"Simple," he said smirking again, "you wont." Wybie's grandmother shook her head again and after several attempts to pull out of the driveway with out hitting anything, drove down the dirt road that connected with the main road to town.

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**Wee....short, crappy chapter! Sorry for any misspellings, I'm lazy and stupid. If you haven't guessed, this takes several weeks/months before the events of the movie, and things should pick up in the next chapter...hopefully.**

**Thanks for reading!**


	2. Chapter 2

Ashland elementary was once the old city hall of the town, but when they constructed a new building in 1950, they simply converted the older one for the school rather than build a new school. However, the building was showing its age in more ways than one. The town was smaller back in 1950, so that size was perfect to house an elementary, but now the town was outgrowing the Victorian structure, but the town didn't see the need to raise taxes to build a secondary school. Despite the size of the school, it had its' own charm about it; perhaps that's why no one wanted to demolish the old thing.

Kids were pouring into the building as the buses and parents dropped them off; having a hard time pulling away from the building because of the congestion of cars and kids weaving in-between them. Driving in these conditions is stressful in itself, but when you throw in a old lady with a lead foot who's driving capabilities were spastic at best...then you're in for one dashboard-gripping ride. Wybie's grandmother darted between cars and past people without hardly slowing down, then came to a dead stop as the breaks squealed in front of the school. She put the car into park and turned to face her grandson, who's hands were clawing the dashboard and his teeth beared and clenched tightly together and eyes as large as dinner plates.

"Now don't act like you're going to die Wyborn," she said with a small glare, "you only have two weeks left of school."

"Y-Yeah." He said glancing over at his grandma and lowering his hand to nervously rub together. He reached for the car door handle and opened the door and was about to step out when his grandma said:

"Aren't you goin' to kiss your grandma goodbye?" He paused, not that he didn't want to kiss his grandma goodbye, he just didn't want to do it out in public with everyone staring. He rubbed his hands again and swallowed hard, but turned around and quickly gave her a kiss on the cheek and mumbled quietly and quickly:

"Kay-I-love-you-bye." and jumped out of the car and closed the door and quickly walked toward the school. She shook her head, and put the car in drive and stepped on the gas...at least she thought it was drive; she nearly backed into a school bus before catching herself, then putting it in drive did she finally leave.

Wybie glanced over his shoulder to see if his grandma was still there, then he sighed out thinking that maybe...

"Hey Wyyyybooorn," called out an irritating voice; he turned to see that it was Jonas Dillen, "can I have a kiss too?" he smirked and walked away from Wybie. Jonas Dillen was the only one who would actually pick on Wybie, even if it meant going out of his way to do so. Blushing from the fact that someone did see him kissing his grandma, he quickly shoved it out of his mind and reached into his pockets. His grandma would have had a fit if she knew that he would always were his trademark gloves to school, but he felt naked enough without his jacket. He put on his gloves and with a bit of renewed confidence, headed for class.

Every year, the last 2 weeks of school are usually pointless for the majority of students, and for teachers. The teachers would give out easy homework assignments that would be easy to grade, just so that they could keep the kids busy and the kids were more or less just required to show up. For the kids who were failing, however, the last two weeks are crunch time, working their butts off trying to get make-up assignments done so that they would not experience the horrors of horrors: being held back. Each class was just about the same: the teacher would either give an easy assignment that was expected to be turned in by the end of class, pop in a movie for the kids to watch or just talk about what to expect the next school year. Wybies' class was in the middle of the latter.

"Next year" said the teacher with his hands on his hips, "will be your last year in elementary school. Now I know that may not seem like much now, but when you do go into middle school...." Wybie tuned out the teacher, he could catch the speech next year or later on that day...or week for that mater. Wybie was in the middle of going over his notes that he had taken on his last exploration through the woods, comparing them to what he had found the previous year to see if there were any subtle changes. After a while he put his notes away and took out a blank piece of paper and started to draw. He started to draw different variations of his bike on how he was going to paint it, or where he was going to mount the motor on it.

As he was doing this, he could feel paper wads and little paper footballs being flicked at the back of his head. He sighed and tried to continue on his sketches, having Jonas sitting right behind him really sucked.

"Yes....Wybie," said the teacher, Wybie looked up quickly at the teacher, "can you tell us the answer?" Wybie chocked, and quickly looked a the clock, a full half-hour had passed and he had missed half the lesson. To make things worse, the teacher asked him for the answer. His eyes darted to the whiteboard and looked at the math problem...oh, good...it was an easy one.

"X=3.25." He said quickly and looked back down at his drawings.

"....Yes, it is." said the teacher slowly, looking hard at Wybie; then continuing the discussion. Soon enough the bell rang and everyone started to gather up their stuff and head out of class. Wybie packed his things in his backpack and was on his way out of the class when the teacher called to him.

"Wybie, a moment please."

'Oh crap,' thought Wybie, 'I've been busted for not paying attention.' Frowning and slouching further down while clasping his hands together, he turned around and walked up to the teachers' desk. Mr. Anderson looked at Wybie with full sincerity and asked:

"How did you solve that math problem earlier today, Wybie?" Wybies' hands fretted all the more and his trade mark stutter returned.

"I-In...m-my he-head." he said quietly. Mr. Anderson had left the problem on the white board just for this. He picked up the red marker and handed it to Wybie.

"Show me." he said inquisitively. All the more nervous, he took the marker and looked at the problem on the board:

1/2x + 1/3 = 5/6x - 3/4

It wasn't that hard of a question to him, but he did as the teacher told him to do and showed his steps that he did in his head. As he wrote down the steps Mr. Anderson didn't say one word and once Wybie put down the pen and took a step back, Mr. Anderson looked at him and said:

"Wybie, do you know that this is an algebra question that you haven't been taught yet?"

"Y-Yes," he stammered, "b-bec-cause you w-were teaching..."

"I wasn't teaching it," said Mr. Anderson, "I was showing you what you would be doing in the next few years." Wybie knew he had been caught not paying attention in class now, he slouched even further (if it was possible) and tried his best to apologize.

"I-I'm-m-m s-sorry for n-not paying attention." he said as he looked away from the teacher. Mr. Anderson bent down and said:

"No, I'm the one who should apologize to you. I now know why you never really listened to me in class, because you already knew it." Wybie looked at the him then had to turn away while backing up; hands nervously clasping each other all the while.

"Look," said Mr. Anderson while pulling out a paper and then stuffing it into an envelope, "I wrote this while everyone worked on the assignment I gave out today, I want you to give this to your grandma. You're not in trouble," he said seeing how freaked out the boy was, "I just want to talk to her, that's all." Wybie frowned again and sadly took the letter and placed it in his backpack, thanked Mr. Anderson and turned to leave the classroom. Wybie sadly put his hands in his pockets and looked at his feet as he walked out the door, things couldn't get worse today for him.

"Way to make us all look stupid Wyborn," said Jonas shoving him hard with a smirk, "see you in gym." Wybie groaned, things just got worse. It's not that he hated gym for the physical aspect. Actually he liked gym, especially running around on the indoor track, it reminded him of running around the woods, but not as much fun. He also liked playing dodge ball and basketball, but what he didn't like was the locker rooms.

In the boys locker room, everyone was changing into their gym clothes and the typical jokes and conversations were going on. One boy took the liberty of wetting a towel and rolling it up and whipping it at people, which of course resulted in a swirly for him. Other boys were talking about what they were going to do in the summer time and who was going to go where and other random conversations that mingled and merged together. The only one who wasn't talking was Wybie, he was too busy looking around to see if anyone was watching.

He use to take his gym clothes into one of the bathroom stalls and change in there, but ever since the day he dropped his pants into the toilet bowl, he stopped doing that. He nervously looked around, seeing if anyone was staring at him, but everyone was too busy with their own things to pay any attention to him. He reluctantly opened his locker and took out his shirt and placed it on the bench and after glancing around one more time, started to lift off his shirt.

"Hey WyyyBooorrrn." said Jonas popping up from the side. Startled, Wybie quickly let go of his shirt and backed away from Jonas while clasping his hands and looking away quickly.

"Ah," said Jonas walking up to him, "and here I thought you were going put on a show for us. Come on, let's see it," he said grabbing his shirt and trying to lift it off of him, "let's see your trademark."

"Cut it out Jonas." said on of the boys. Most of the boys in the locker room had stopped talking to each other at this point to watch. The other boys had gotten over the fact that Wybie had a hunchback clear back in kindergarten; Jonas was the only one who would still tease him. However, they didn't try to stop him from teasing him, they more or less just wanted to watch the show.

"Why should I," said Jonas grabbing Wybies' shirt again, "I'm just joking."

Wybie had put up with this everyday for years, and every day he would shrug it off and continue on, but today instead of reluctantly backing down, anger started to boil inside of him. Without thinking he shoved Jonas away before realizing it and when he did, the slouched again and started to mumble a apology, but it was too late. Jonas lunged forward, grabbing Wybies' shirt and hair at the same time while ramming him into the lockers and picking him up slightly.

"Oh, so you think you're tough huh," said Jonas letting go of his hair and grabbing onto the collar of his shirt, "you wana fight or somethin' freak?" Wybie tried his best not to whimper, but one escaped his lips anyway. He closed his eyes, waiting for the blows, when:

"Enough," yelled out the coach, making the locker room quiet enough to hear the showers dripping, "let him go Dillen." The coach marched over to the two boys and yanked Jonas off of Wybie and looked hard at him.

"You're done," he said pointing to the door and to the assistant coach, "go with Miss Smith to the principles' office, now." Jonas more or less shrugged and started to the door giving Wybie one last glance that said, 'You're mine' and then left the locker room. The other boys at this point had gotten ready and the coach told them to go out and start stretching. All the boys ran out and the only ones left in the room were the coach and Wybie. Wybie more or less had stayed where he had fallen down and sat there, confused. The coach walked up to him and kneeled down and looked at him with concern.

"Are you alright, Wybie?" Wybie looked up at the coach and started to his feet, legs shaking all the while.

"Y-Yes," he said trying to straiten his shirt, "j-just messing a-around."

"Look, Wybie," said the coach, "if you don't want to do gym today, I won't say anything and you can do a packet to make up for it, if you'd like."

".....I think th-that I'd like that." he said, relaxing slightly. The coach nodded and went to his office and grabbed a work packet for him to work on. After 15 minutes, the packet was completed and Wybie had the rest of the period to think about what happened. Not with Jonas, but what had happened with him. He had not felt like that ever, and it sort of felt good...to push him back, but it was wrong and he knew it. He pushed the idea out of his mind and decided to continue his drawings of his soon-to-be bike and then try to figure out what else he should get for it.

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All he knew for sure, was that Jonas was now determined to fight him, and Wybie tired his best to avoid him. Wybie constantly looked over his shoulders while waiting for his grandma to pick him up, to see if Jonas was approaching him. Suddenly, he could hear breaks squealing and the motor rattling. His grandma pulled up quickly almost rear-ending the car ahead of her. Wybie ran up to the car and slammed the door shut and slumped into the seat while glancing out the window. This odd behavior, even for him, had not gone unnoticed by his grandmother and as they were driving she asked:

"Is everything alright Wyborn?"

Wybie didn't say anything, not really wanting to talk about it. She looked down at her grandson and knew exactly what to do. Instead of heading for home, she took a sharp U turn back towards town and drove right to the local malt shop. Wybie knew what she was doing too, and was going to do his best not to give in, but in his heart, he knew he would falter in the end. She ordered his favorite: a chocolate malt with whipped cream and almonds and a cherry on top. She ordered herself a soft served vanilla ice cream cone and then they drove to the town park and parked underneath an old oak tree and ate their treats in silence. He knew that they only did this whenever she wanted him to open up and talk to her, and he wasn't going to, not this time.

"Now," she said gently after eating her cone, "are you goin' to tell me what's bothering my little man?" He tried not to look up at her, rather swirl the straw in the malt, but her soft wrinkled hand reached over and gently took up his chin and moved his face slowly so that he looked into her wrinkled smiling face; that's all it took to open him up like a book.

"T-There's this boy in school," he said setting aside his malt and clasping his hands together in his usual manner, "you know Jonas Dillan?" She nodded, not wanting to interrupt him.

"Well," he said rubbing his arm nervously, "I---I think he want's to fight me, but I don't want to fight him....well....I-I don't know. He's been pushing me and pushing me to fight him all year, now that I think about it, and...grandma," he said looking up at her sadly, "I don't want to fight him, but at the same time I think I do want to fight him. I-I'm...." he said balling-up his fists, but then sighed and slumped back into the chair. She knew how much trouble he had been having with that other boy, and she knew that one day things would eventually boil over, but she remained quiet, letting him vent his frustration.

"I-I don't know what to do," he said looking at the dashboard, "I don't want to fight him because it's wrong to do so and then every day I have to put up with the same crap from him and every day I just get more and more frustrated and....and then on the other hand, maybe if I did...ah, I d-don't kn-know." he said running his hands through his hair, only to get them slightly tangled within for a moment. There was an uneasy pause, but she kept silent, waiting for him to react.

"Grandma," he finally said looking up to her, "I don't know what to do. If I go to the principal, I'll be even more....well," he said looking away, not wanting to go into that, "but if I do fight him....what should I do?"

That's what she had been waiting for.

"You listen to me, Wyborn," she said sternly, "no matter what, you never—never raise your fists to that boy. No matter how hard he dogs you or harasses you, you don't ever throw the first punch. Understand?" He nodded, thinking that's what she would say.

"However," she said still in the serious tone, "if he ever hits you...you beat the living stuffin' out of that boy." He looked up at his grandma, completely shocked.

"I mean it," she said sternly, "you never hit him first, but if he ever hits you, then you fight back Wyborn." And that's all she said about it. He looked up at the sweet old lady who had practically raised him, a little old lady who looked like she wouldn't hurt a fly, tell him to beat the snot out of someone if they ever hit him first. He looked down and thought about it, not really wanting to do that, but he figured if he lasted the last two weeks without and confrontation then things should work out ok.

She started the car back up and started for home. Wybie looked out the window and realized that grandma was right, it was going to rain today, as it had been raining all that time while they talked in the car. Realizing that he wouldn't be able to work on his bike or go exploring that day, he tried to think of things to do in the house while watching rain drops on the windshield race each other down it and eventually merging with each other at the bottom.

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**Ok, I cut this chapter in half...it was getting long. Thanks for reading!**


	3. Chapter 3

Being stuck inside the house was torture for him, he always wanted to go out side in the middle of the rain to see what wildlife would emerge. Grandma never shared his passion and would always acted like the rain was going to melt him, or at the very worst leave him with a cold. He sighed looking out of the window , all of his planes had been ruined because of the rain. He had planned to walk over to Mr. Hoods' shop and pick up the motor after school, but that wasn't going to happen today. If that didn't work out then he would go out and explore some more in the woods, but he could never really get anywhere very fast. As soon as he had his bike all ready to go...but that thought just was a repeat of earlier disappointment. All he did all day was watch nature shows and the science channel, not as much fun as being in nature and doing the science things for yourself.

He looked over at the clock, seeing it was finally 8 o'clock.

"I'm going to bed," he said to his grandma walking past her as she watched a old romance movie on t.v., "I'm tired." She looked up at him and said:

"If you really want to Wyborn," she said looking over her shoulder at him. As he ascended the stairs, she called out to him:

"Wyborn," he paused and looked down at her, "things will be better tomorrow, you'll see." He faintly smiled and nodded to her and said good night one last time and continued up the stairs. He entered his room and walked over to his closet to pick out his night clothes when he noticed something moving near the window. He turned and saw two glowing orbs blink at him; he smiled and walked over to the window. He opened the window and a ratty black cat jumped down from it and started to walk into the room.

"Hey you," said Wybie, following the cat after closing the window, "haven't seen you in a while." He paused and watched the cat jump onto his neatly folded bed and place something on the bed. He walked over to the bed and saw that the cat had placed a dead bird (a robin to be precise) on the pillow. Normally most people would be disgusted by this, but Wybie smiled and sat on the bed and started to stroke the cat as he picked up the bird carefully. (gloves on of course)

"Thanks," he said looking at the dead bird, "you did a good job with this one, the feathers are nice and intact not a bit of blood." The cat purred, as if accepting the complement. Wybie got up and while still carrying the bird, went to his closet and pulled out a old shoe box and placed the dead animal inside; he would burry the animal later after the cat left. He then returned to the task of getting ready for bed and after changing into his pajamas, he turned around and saw the cat still sitting on his bed, cleaning his chest. Wybie turned off the light and crawled into bed then the cat walked onto his chest and rubbed his face. He reached up and petted the cat again, but without the gloves on he realized how wet the cat was.

"I see," he said with a crooked smile, "you need a warm place to spend the night out of the rain and dry off. That's fine," he said; the smile fading and his stroking slowed, "I could use the company. Company that doesn't judge me." The cat turned his head and looked at the boy, and seeing that Wybie wasn't looking at him, reached out with a paw and patted his ear as if trying to get his attention back. He looked at the cat, who looked at him as if he was actually interested in hearing him out, which was rare for the cat. He sighed and adjusted himself in a more comfortable position. The cat then walked onto his stomach and lied down and sat facing him and stared at him.

"You know all about me and Jonas Dillan," he said stroking the cat, "and how he's always on my case. Well, it's starting to get out of control and he wants to fight me, but I don't want to fight him....because," he said looking away, "I know I'll lose. I mean lets face it, I may be fit, but I'm not strong like he is and even if I did fight him and started to win...he," he said tears welling up in his eyes and his voice cracked, "he has friends to back him up." The cat looked at him and got up only enough to reach over with his head and rub Wybies face with it. Wybie chuckled as he wiped the tears away and scratched behind the cats' ear.

"Now don't get me wrong," he said smiling at the cat, "you're my friend, but it would be nice to have a friend who could talk back." The cat seemed to glare at him; he smiled again and said:

"Ok, ok...I take it back, it would be nice to have a _human_ friend." He continued to stroke the cat and after a while, his stroking slowed down as he started to fall asleep. However, as the cat silently watched him, he saw his face sometimes flicker with pain, thinking about the Dillan boy and how truly lonely he was. The cat purred softly and as if on queue, he stopped stroking the cat and fell asleep, peacefully. The cat stayed on the warm boy and he himself continued to purr softly and soon enough fell asleep as well.

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The following two days were bothersome and disappointing ones for Wybie: the rain never let up so he could never get his motor from Mr. Hood and Jonas was more than ever on his case, determined to pick a fight. Every day was more and more frustrating than the last, and his usual calm way of thinking was going out the window, and was replaced with calm anger. Wybie didn't like feeling this way, but nothing he did seemed to lift his mood. He was sure that he could probably calm himself down if only he could go exploring in the woods or work on his bike, but the rain made sure that all he could do was stew on his frustration. His normal means of venting were plugged and old ones began to reemerge.

Whenever he felt extreme anger, frustration, fear, boredom and yes, loneliness: he felt hungry and ate. When he was younger he realized (from reading books) that this was called 'emotional eating' and it was not that good for you, so when ever he felt it come on, he would take his mind off of it by tinkering with things or running around the woods. This worked for a number of years and he all but forgot about it, but now that he was more or less forced to abandon his passions and the added pressure of Jonas, made the hunger return. Trying to not fall back into old habits, he didn't eat and because he didn't eat, he felt all the more frustrated and all it was a downward spiral of frustration that he couldn't seem to bring himself out of.

Finally, on Thursday, the rain stopped in the morning and gave him the hope that finally, he could go to Mr. Hoods' shop and finally get that motor and things could go back to normal. However, he had to survive school, and the way things had been going this would prove to be a challenge.

In the locker rooms, the boys were once again changing into their gym outfits, talking and laughing. Wybie entered the room and as soon as he did so, Jonas walked up beside him and once again, started tearing at him with his words.

"So Wyborn," he said mockingly with a smirk, "how are you today?" Wybie stayed quiet, trying his best to ignore him, but every time Jonas talked, his stomach tightened up to remind him of his anger.

"Not talking today still," said Jonas, "you've been awfully quiet since yesterday, but then again, it has been nice not to-to h-hear your v-voice." he said mocking his stutter. Wybie didn't even flinch, but his stomach clenched all the tighter. He started to open his locker and blocked out all conversations in his head, so well that even Jonas's words muted down and sounded like he was under water. He sighed with small satisfaction and opened his locker and pulled out his cloths when he felt warm breath next to his left ear and heard Jonas whisper in his ear:

"Then again, I wasn't abandoned by my parents." Wybie stiffened up at this, his breath caught in the middle of his throat and went slightly pale. Jonas saw this and knew he had struck a nerve with him. Wybie turned to face his tormenter and glared at him, fists and stomach clenched tightly, but his grandmothers words remained in his head; it took all that he had not to act out of anger and it took even more to turn around and ignore the painful words. Nothing was said for a moment between the two boys, then finally:

"Wybie." said Jonas, like he had something important to say. He slowly turned around to look at him and as soon as he did, he felt something hit his left cheek with enough force to make him stumble to the right. It didn't hurt, rather, his mind went blank and he leapt onto Jonas and a fight broke out. The boys in the locker room immediately stopped talking and watched in excitement at the fight, forming a circle around the two boys. Wybie had seen on the television some shows that talked about people having an out of body experience, and he thought that it was just over imaginative minds, but here he was, experiencing it for himself. He didn't feel like he was controlling himself at all, just more or less in for the ride. His mind was a haze of anger and sadness and was not all that aware of what was going on. He didn't know how long the fight was or if he was getting any blows in or receiving any in turn, but his mind snapped back to reality when he felt a large hand grab his shoulder and pull him back.

"That's enough, Wybie." said the coach, looking down at him very sternly. Only then did Wybie felt how tired he was, his breath was shallow and shaky, as well as his arms. He looked over at Jonas who was in the grip of the coaches other hand and saw that he was bleeding from his nose and a cut on his forehead. He suddenly felt an odd mix of pride and guilt, but this feeling was interrupted by the sudden coaches pulling on his shirt as he, the coach and Jonas walked to the principals' office.

* * *

Wybie sat on the chair sadly, rubbing his sore cheek; it was the only blow he received in the fight. He looked up at Jonas and saw his right eye was beginning to swell and darken up as well as his face. He held up a tissue to his nose to prevent the blood from dripping, a band-aid covered his cut on his forehead. Despite being the looser, Jonas glared with more hate then ever at Wybie and looked like he was ready for round two. Wybie looked down at his feet and pressed his hands to his stomach, feeling nauseous with worry on what would exactly happen. He heard the door open and looked up and saw his grandmother shuffle in wearing her shawl and her favorite green dress, looking very serious. She looked down at him and showed no emotion or expression as she did, and sat right next to him and folded her hands in her lap. He looked up at her and then sadly looked back down at his feet when he heard the door open again and saw Mr. and Mrs. Dillan enter the room.

They were a nice looking couple, ones that looked very respectable and kind. They didn't look like ones who were raising a little hell spawn. They looked at Jonas and his mother placed her hands lovingly on his shoulders and was quietly asking if he was alright. Jonas started to talk to them in a winy voice that he never used, trying to gain sympathy from his parents. The parents of Jonas at the same time turned and looked at Wybie, making him gasp slightly and press harder on his stomach. He looked away from their gaze, thinking that they hated him for hurting their son. Then the principals' office door swung open and out came the coach and several students who were in the locker room.

"Please," said the principal to everyone in the office, "come in and have a seat." Everyone followed him into his office and sat in the comfortable chairs in his office. Mr. and Mrs. Dillan sat with Jonas in-between them on one side of the room while Wybie and his grandmother sat on the other side, all facing the principals' desk. The principal was a tall, large dark skinned man, older than Jonas's parents, but younger than his grandmother. He looked threatening to Wybie at the moment, but perhaps that's because he was in trouble at the moment.

"I'm sure that you know why you're all here in my office today," he said in a deep voice that seemed to rumble. Jonas' parents and his grandmother nodded in agreement, "well, from what the coach and several students saw from this was that Jonas here," he said looking at the boy, "was the one who made the first hit."

"Oh," said Mr. Dillan looking down at him with a little bit of anger, "he was?"

"Yes, and from what the other students told me, he had been the one who was also provoking Wyborn to fight him as well." Jonas slumped into his chair as both his parents looked down at him.

"That being said," the principal said, "fighting is highly frowned at here at Ashland Elementary, and immediate action must take place. Wyborn," he said fixing his gaze on him, making him very nervous, "for being in a fight, you're suspended for one day of school, including the rest of today." He sadly nodded in agreement, seeing it seemed like a fair 'punishment'.

"Jonas," he said still in the stern tone, "for provoking the fight and throwing the first punch, you are suspend for a week, including today." Jonas's eyes grew large at hearing this and his mother said respectfully:

"But Mr. Jones, if he misses next week, he'll...he'll not get his make up work and be held back."

"He should have thought of that before picking a fight." said Mr. Jones flatly.

"Yes," agreed Mr. Dillan, looking down at his son with disappointment, "he should have." Jonas looked up at his dad and mom and saw how angry they were at him, then looked over at Wybie with the same anger, but his father grabbed his collar and pulled hard at it.

After the meeting was over, Mr. and Mrs. Dillan and his grandmother were talking to each other very quietly and respectfully and after speaking their peace, they gathered their children and walked out of the school. Wybies' grandmother didn't say one word to him while they were in the school, and he didn't say one word to her, but as they walked out of the school while he looked melancholy she said to him:

"So Wyborn," she said to him not looking down at him, "did he hit you hard?" He thought about the question, not really knowing the real answer.

"I guess." he mumbled.

"Did you hit him harder?" He quickly glanced up at her and while running his sore hands together thinking about it, he finally said:

"Y-Yeah, I think I did."

"...Good." was all she said and that was the end of the discussion.

* * *

**Thanks to all who have read my story so far! And to all the reviews I've gotten so far, I appreciate all of them!**


	4. Chapter 4

The car ride home was silent and tense. Both of them didn't say one word to each other, making it hard for Wybie to tell if his grandmother was mad at him or not. When they did get home, she turned to him as they stepped out of the car and said quietly:

"Lets put some ice on that face of yours, and some ibuprofen for the pain." They walked to the kitchen and his grandmother prepared the ice pack.

"I'll get the medison." said Wybie, wanting to be helpful.

"No you won't," she said turning to him, "the last time you got into the medison cabinet, you ate all of your multivitamins!"

"I was four," he said in his defense, "and besides, they shouldn't make those Flintstone vitamins taste like candy." She sighed and reached up to the medison cabinet and pulled out a bottle of ibuprofen. She then got a glass of water and handed him the pill and the glass of water; after he took the pill she handed him the ice pack. She started to put the pill bottle away when he said quietly and quickly:

"You're mad at me, aren't you?" She turned to him and looked at him.

"Now what makes you say a thing like that, Wyborne?"

"You're disappointed," he said looking away from her, "that I got in a fight. Y-Yeah I did what you told me to, b-but..."

"Wyborne," she interrupted walking up to him and hugging him, "I'm not disappointed, how could I be? You're a good boy, and I'm proud of you, and don't you dare think otherwise." He smiled and returned the hug, glad to know that she wasn't mad at him.

"Now put that ice on," she said letting him go and standing tall again, "and keep it on a good half-hour; after that I want you to go look inside the trunk of the car, there's somethin' rattlin' around in there." He did as he was told to and after he put the ice pack in the kitchen sink, he went out to the car and opened the trunk and inside was a small battered, slightly oily engin. A crooked smile crept on his face and he ran back inside and found his grandmother standing over the stove. He ran up to her and hugged her from behind with more force than was required. His grandmother made a surprised sound followed with a warm chuckle wile patting his hands. Just as fast as he had hugged her, he ran up the stairs and up to his room to change his cloths.

* * *

The following weeks were good ones. Every day after school, Wybie would work on the old engin trying to make it work again, while also getting the bike ready to have the engin mounted on it. Even school was fun. The last week was filled with nothing but games or movies to watch or other activities to do. Although Wybie was slightly worried that Jonas was going to do something, but during the last week, he never came to school at all. He decided that since he was going to be held back a grade and since there was nothing that he or his parents could do, they just let him stay at home. Wybie was relieved, he wouldn't have to deal with him for three whole months.

After school was out, Wybie continued to work on his bike or go out and explore the woods and after three weeks, the bike was complete. He stepped back and looked at the bike with a very satisfied look. He walked up to the bike and sat on it and grabbed the key that was in the ignition switch that he had rigged onto the handle bars and held his breath. He turned the key and the engin sputtered and turned and when he thought it wasn't going to work, it started and roared to life. He looked behind at the engin and saw that some smoke was coming out of it, but it wasn't anything major to worry about. He then looked at his right handlebar and grabbed it. He had spent several days working on it, wanting to give his bike a motorcycle feel. He twisted the handle and when he did the engin revved up. A small smile crept up, that was good and all but the true test was coming up. He flipped a switch and turned his bike around facing the open door and with the engin still sputtering, he revved it up again a little too hard because the bike lurched forward and almost left his grip.

"Yes!" He cried out, putting the kick-stand down and turning the motor off. He ran toward the house and flew past the kitchen and up the stairs and into his room. He grabbed his old backpack that contained notepads and jars and other tools he would need. He ran up to his dresser and grabbed his camera that his grandmother gave him when she had gotten herself a new one. Then he grabbed his most important tool, his mask.

His mask was an old welding mask that Mr. Hood had given him several years ago and after a week, the mask had been transformed. He had took a large old microscope's rotator device and three different magnifying glasses had replaced the broken visor of the mask and made it into a three view magnifying...thing. He then put a crankshaft on the right side of it so he could change the views without having to fumble around the mask to reach it. After all that, his artistic side came out and he painted on it so that it looked like a scary yet wicked cool skull on it. His grandmother about had a heart-attack when she saw it, and it took him the rest of the day convincing her not to call and make a psychiatrist appointment for him.

He placed the mask on his head and swung the backpack on his shoulder and ran back down the stairs and was about to fly out the door, when:

"Wyborne! Come here for a moment." He sighed and turned around and walked into the living room where his grandmother was sitting on her chair with some paperwork on her lap and talking on the phone. He patiently waited for his grandmother to finish her phone call, but all too soon he started to dance in place and looking very much like a small child needing to use the bathroom. Finally she put down the phone and looked up at him.

"Now stop that fussin', and stand still like a good boy. I need you to do something for me."

"What?" he asked, sounding disappointed that he couldn't go out. His grandmother looked away with the slightest hint of worry on her face, but then looked back at him.

"I need you to go to the Pink Palace and collect the rent for me."

"R-Really?" he said looking back at her.

"Yes, but do it quick," she said looking as stern as ever, "do not go inside at all and as soon as you have the rent, come back home. I mean it, don't go inside." Wybie had heard this same lecture for as long as he could remember and it was imprinted into his brain, but this was the first time that he was actually allowed to go near it without his grandmother by his side.

"I'd do it myself, but I have to get this paperwork done."

"What paperwork?"

"Oh, didn't I tell you? The middle apartment is finally gettin' filled. The left side one."

"That's cool, I'll go and do that now." he said turning toward the kitchen.

"I mean it Wyborne, do not go inside at all." She said standing up sounding all the more stern.

"I know." he said still walking.

"And don't go killin' yourself on that thing you made," she said with a sigh, "I don't feel like having a paramedic scrappin' you up with a sponge."

"I wont." he said and went out the door, jumped on his bike and headed toward the Pink Palace.

* * *

Wybie took his time getting to the Pink Palace, deciding to test his bike along the way, revving the engin and doing tricks on it and treating it like a dirt bike more than anything. Oh, yes. He was going to have some fun with this puppy. Soon enough, he had to head over to the Pink Palace. He rolled up to the old building and dismounted his bike and looked up at it. His grandma would tell him that the house was over 150 years old, making it a very large house for its' day, and boy was it starting to show its' age. The fading pink siding was falling off and what wasn't was slowly decaying. Anyone else who would have been renting from it would have probably complained about it, but the three renters never did.

Wybie took off his mask and swung off his backpack and placed them neatly next to his bike and started toward the basement apartment. He reached the door and knocked on the door, then silently counted:

'Three....two....'

Just then three Scotty dogs began barking as loud as they could at the door. The door opened and the dogs ran out and started to bark around him.

"Oh, cease that yapping of yours!" said a small round old woman with a walker. She looked up at him with a smile.

"Hello Wyborne," she said happily, "what brings you here by yourself? Aren't you usually with your grandmother?"

"Grandma had some business to take care of Miss. Spink," he said while trying to pet a dog that wouldn't hold still, "she asked me to collect the rent for her."

"Oh, yes of course," she said while shuffling around, "would you like to come in and wait in side while I go fetch it?"

"No thank you," he said politely, "grandma told me not to....t-to uh, t-to take too long a-and told me to hurry." he fumbled out, lying wasn't all that easy for him but it work and Miss. Spink smiled and walked inside to find the envelope. He waited patiently for her to return looking down at his feet and listening for her to return. It wasn't like he had nothing to do while waiting, he quietly listened to the old ladies talking to each other, trying to remember where they had set the envelope, having another round in there never ending argument. Eventually the envelope was found and Miss. Forceable walked toward the door with it in hand.

"Here you go lovie," she said squinting down at him, "hold out your hand." He reached up to grab the envelope but just as quick as anything, Miss. Forceable shoved the envelope into what she thought was his hand but was in fact his hair. It stayed in place in his hair and he looked up at it from the upper corners of his eyes, his hand still outstretched.

"Tell your grand-mum that I said hello," she said smiling down at what she assumed was his face and went to pat his head but just ended up patting his outstretched hand, "good day young man." She went back inside and closed the door. Wybie stood there for a moment, wondering when he reached their age, would he be just as senile as they were. He reached up and grabbed the envelope and while climbing up the steps, looked inside to see if they had actually filled the check out. Last time they just had placed a blank check inside, but they had filled it out right this time. He put the envelope inside his jacket and walked up to his bike, grabbing his mask. He didn't want to go up the stairs without it.

Mr. Bobinsky was nice enough, but fo some reason or another, there was a cold war going on with the two. He wasn't sure why, but whenever he talked to him and was on his way home, he would always get pelted with beets from Mr. Bobinsky. He put that thought in the back of his mind and shrugged it off and went up the steps. He reached the door and knocked on it. He waited for a moment but no one came. He started to knock on it again, this time longer and harder. Suddenly the door opened and he almost fell forward. He looked up and saw a less than pleased Mr. Bobinsky glaring down at him; he had shaving cream on his face. Wybie gave a nervous chuckle and adjusted the mask on his head.

"Uh, h-hi Mr. Bobinsky," he smiled sheepishly up at him, Mr. Bobinsky didn't say anything, "well, anyway...m-my grandma asked me t-to collect the rent for her, and...." he looked up at him again and noticed the metal on his shirt.

"Oh, I know what that is," he said pointing to it, " I didn't know you helped with that. Say, is that why you're a bit blue? I didn't think that radiation could turn a person blue but maybe there's another reason...maybe all those beets that you..." he paused when a dirty envelope appeared close to his face. He looked up at Mr. Bobinsky and saw that he seemed slightly more annoyed with him, the shaving cream dripping down from his face and onto his shirt.

"W-Well, anyway," said Wybie, clearly getting his point, "I-I'll just give this to grandma and tell her that you said 'hi'." He sheepishly lowered his mask and quickened his pace down the stairs and went toward his bike, but before ridding off, he took one last look at the house. He knew his grandmother always told him to never go inside, but whenever something is forbidden for a child, the more they want to see why. Suddenly he felt something hit his head hard and he cried out and looked down at the object and saw it was a beet and he could hear Mr. Bobinsky cursing in Russian. He looked up and saw him gearing up for another throw; he quickly started the motor and road off toward his own house as fast as he could.

* * *

**Sorry for the long wait! I got the movie only a week ago and well....yeah, I should be updating my other stories as well sometime this week as well. Thanks for reading!**


	5. Chapter 5

Wybie skidded to a halt, looking back toward the now distant Pink Palace. He sighed and adjusted himself on his bike and took a moment to look around and noticed that he was near the old well. He had been up there more than a million times and didn't hold any interest for him at the moment. He started up the engin and headed for home. As he pulled up to the house he revved the engin for no reason what so ever, other than just to make it roar, and put it away inside the garage. As soon as he reached the kitchen door, he wiped his feet on the door mat that was already too caked with mud and grease to really be of any use, and went to...

"Oh, no you don't," said his grandmother very sternly, glaring at him with the mop in her hands, "I just finished! You go and take those filthy shoes off out on the front porch and then you can come inside." He rolled his eyes, but he did as his grandmother told him to do and went around the house. As soon as he entered the house, he walked up to his grandma and said while pulling out the envelopes:

"H-Here's the rent from everyone." She took the envelopes and looked down at him and said:

"You didn't go inside now, did you?"

"No grandma," he said sighing, "of course not." She narrowed her eyes and then looked down at the envelopes while waking away.

"Thank you Wyborne, you're such a good boy."

"Thanks grandma." he said while walking over to her chair and looked at the paperwork that she was looking at earlier.

"So grandma," he asked, "when are the new renters coming?"

"Well," she said from the kitchen walking back toward him, "they're from out of state, and they need time to sell their house. I would presume about two to three weeks from now, or at the beginnin' of next month."

"Hrm," said Wybie wile still looking at the paperwork, "so, it's a family?"

"A young couple," she said gently taking the paperwork from him and sitting back down in her chair, "writers I think."

"Oh," he said sadly, looking away, his eyes falling onto a very old photo album, "Hey," he said while picking it up, "I've never seen this."

"Oh, this old thing," she said smiling slightly and taking it from him, "I found it while looking for some old paper work. I haven't looked at this thing for years. All of these are from when I was a young vixen." she said smirking at him and hand a bit of song in her voice. She opened the book and motioned him to come and sit on her lap to look with her, but he felt to old to sit there so he settled to look over her shoulder. She flipped a page and saw a young woman standing next to a old oak tree wile smiling brightly.

"That's me," she said pointing to the girl, "when I was oh...I'd say 15. And here," she said pointing to a picture of her when she was a bit younger with a older woman, "is me and my grandmother making cookies." she continued to flip pages and each picture held a story; each story she told the more he voice sounded like she was in a dream. She flipped another page and when she saw it, she blushed and brought her hand to her mouth and happily chuckled.

"Ooh! There he is," she said pointing to a picture, "there's your granddaddy when we were kids." Wybie took a look at the picture, he had never seen a picture of his grandfather as a young man. In the picture, was a smiling couple holding each other in a loving embrace in front of what looked like a old oak tree, sitting on a old well.

"Mmm-hmm," she said while stroking the face of the man in the picture, "he was such a ladies man. We would always secretly meet by the old well every Saturday night just to be together."

"Why?"

"Things were different back then Wyborne," she said looking over at him, "and besides, it was so romantic. Ohh...we felt like a modern day Romeo and Juliet." she said chuckling and smiling at the memory.

"And when he proposed...Ohh," she said closing the book and looking faraway, as if seeing it all over again, "it was so romantic. He showed me this," she said showing her wedding ring to him, "and was so nervous, he could hardly talk. Daddy was SO mad!" Wybie opened the book to where they were and looked at the picture again.

"Because grandpa was white guy?"

"Yes," she said getting a little more serious, "daddy warned me that I was pickin' a hard path in life; asking for more trouble than I could handle. And he was right, it was very hard for us, but nothing we couldn't handle. Not many people were happy about our marriage, but times changed and things were better, we had your mama and had ten more wonderful years, but then," she said looking at the picture with sad eyes, "there was that accident at the factory." Wybie look up at her and then looked down at the pages he looked down and saw his granddad holding a little baby in his arms.

"Hey, is that mom as a baby?" he asked pointing to the picture. She looked at it and nodded. He started to get excited.

"Are there anymore of her in here?"

"Not in this one Wyborne," she said looking at him, "this one is mostly just of me and your grandfather."

"Then how about we go to the beginning of the book and see you as a little girl." he said reaching for the book, but his grandma suddenly slammed it shut and got a little tense.

"I really don't have any pictures of my childhood, there was only the one and...I don't have it anymore."

"Oh," he said wondering why she suddenly go so cold, "what was it of?" She didn't say anything, but more or less slouched into the chair.

"O-Or if you don't remember what it was of," he asked, 'M-Maybe you can tell me about when you were a kid. I-I-I mean y-you never talk about..."

"I think it time for you to get into the tub and then start on your chores." she said while getting up with the photo album in hand and walking to her bedroom. He looked over at her and sighed, she always would do that whenever he asked her. All he really knew was that she was a twin and her twin sister disappeared while her family lived at the Pink Palace before it was even called that. The only other thing he knew about it was that his great-grandfather had worked hard to purchase that house for his family and worked even harder to keep it, and when he and her mother passed away, she got the house and turned it into apartments. That was it, nothing more. He sighed and even though he was going to go explore the woods on his bike, he thought it best not to make his grandma any more angrier than she was and headed up to take a bath.

* * *

The next couple of weeks were just your standard summer days, however this summer was quite dreary and grey. Despite the weather, Wybie was having probably the best summer he ever had. Now that he had his bike, he could do more longer. He could go further than before and carry more than ever. He found things and places he had never seen before and everyday was more interesting than the last. Soon enough, a month flew away as if it was just a week and his grandma was getting ready to head over to the Pink Palace to supervise the cleaning crew for the new renters.

"How long do you think you'll be?" asked Wybie excitedly, finally having the place to himself for at least for a afternoon.

"At least three hours, maybe more," she said while putting on her shawl, "That apartment actually hasn't ever had anyone in it since...well when I lived there. We've always rented out the other middle apartment. I only gave them this one because they really wanted the extra space."

"When are they moving in again?"

"Either tomorrow or the next day," she said grabbing her keys, "just depends on when they arrive."

"Well, have a fun time bossing people around," said Wybie grabbing a book and sitting down to read it, "I'm just going to stay inside today, you know since you just finished washing my jacket."

"Yes," she said glancing over her shoulder at him, "and it left the water dark brown. Honestly Wyborne, I swear you role in the mud on purpose. I've never seen a boy who can get so dirty so fast." He shrugged his shoulders and continued to read.

"And while I'm gone," she said turning back to him, "don't be watchin' no mind rottin' garbage on that t.v., I don't want you turin' into a no-good gang banger or having to take you to a psychologist because of some horror movie."

"Yeah grandma," he said sighing and looking up at her, "better be careful about what I watch, 'cuz if I watch that no good Mr. Rogers, the next thing you know I'll have tattoos and nose rings and a gun and be in a gang and have track marks on my arms and a meth lab and..."

"Don't you sass me boy," she said very sternly, "and that's exactly what I'm talking about. You shouldn't even know about those things! When this is over, I'm goin' to get one of those 'V chip' things I've been hearin' about." He groaned at that and just slumped down into the chair.

"I'll be back soon." she said and went out. He continued to look at the book until he heard the car start and drive away. He got up, looked out the window to make sure she was gone and immediately ran to the kitchen, made a horribly unhealthy Ice-cream Sunday with brownies and cookies and for all weird things canned cheese whizz toppings and ran back to the living room. He wasn't going to miss the Zombie Gore Feast Marathon on t.v. for anything. He put a pillow on the ground and turned on the t.v. and found the right channel just in time.

After a good two hours of watching bad zombie movies, Wybie himself looked like one. He was so into the movie that he didn't even hear the cat meowing for him outside the window. After several minutes of wasted breath on the cats part, the cat decided that since the boy wasn't coming to him, he would just go to the boy. The cat made its way to the roof of the house and found a open window. The cat squeezed his way thru the window and made its way downstairs. While still at the top of the stairs the cat looked down at the boy. It went down the stairs and walked up to the boy who's face was in his hands while lying on his belly on the ground watching some poor sap getting mauled by a gang of zombies. The cat walked up to him and rubbed his head against his arm. Wybie, without looking at the cat gently shoved the cat away and said in a monotone way:

"Shh...zombies....must....watch..."

The cat seemed to get annoyed with that and started to gently bat his face with his paws. Wybie rolled over and moaned, acting as if the cat had actually hurt him.

"Oh, why must you torment me! My one and only day when I can watch this and you want me to give you attention! You're a wild cat," he said rolling back to where he was, "go get a moose or something and eat that." The cat started to beat his face again, not taking no for an answer. He groaned and slowly got up and looked up at the clock.

"Ugh...I guess it was a good thing you got me up, there's only about ten minutes before grandma gets home." He went to turn off the t.v. when a particularly gory bit started to play. A man getting ripped in half while being eaten alive by zombies.

"Choke on them!" the man weakly called out.

"Ssswwweeeeeet." said Wybie and flicked off the television set. He stretched his back and felt his back pop and started to gather his plates and empty soda cans. After the living room was cleared of any debris, he walked into the kitchen and while he was making his famous 'stray cat delight' cat food, he started to talk to the cat as he usually did.

"I bet you're wondering why grandma isn't here right now, kicking you out of the house with the broom huh? Well, she's over at the Pink Palace supervising the clean up crew that's cleaning out the big middle apartment." Although he wasn't paying much attention to the cat at the moment, he could have sworn the cat growled a bit.

"I'm going as fast as I can, hold your horses." he said to the cat. "Anyway, grandma says that the new renters will ether move in tomorrow or the next day. Maybe I'll go over and see who they are, you know from a distance. I swear grandma has this sixth sense when it comes to the Pink Palace." He set down the mixed meat platter he fixed up for the cat. The cat sauntered over to the food and started to eat it. Wybie just finished putting the meats back into the fridge when...

"How many times must I tell you," said his grandma with hands on hips and a stern voice, making him nearly drop the plate, "to NOT let that ratty thing the house!"

"H-He found his way in grandma." He said in his defense. Grandma however wasn't in the mood for excuses; grabbing her broom and shuffling toward the cat.

"Shoo you! Scat! Outside with ya! Go on!" The cat looked up at her and if a cat could, would certainly would be rolling his eyes. The cat stood up and sauntered at his leisure toward the kitchen door, despite being batted by a boom. She opened the door and the cat walked out, sat down near the corner of the steps and looked up at her as if saying, 'Satisfied'? She closed the door and walked over to her grandson and said while patting his head.

"Alright, you head upstairs and have a bath and get ready for bed." He nodded and did as he was told, as he was ascending the stairs he had the sneaky suspicion that he forgot to do something.

"Wyborne Lovatt! What on earth have you been watching?!?"

"Oh, that what it was..." he said to himself rubbing his hands, "f-forgot t-to change the channel before I turned it off."


	6. Chapter 6

The next day, Wybie took the liberty of sleeping in instead of waking up an hour before sunrise. When he did wake however, he hurried to get washed and dressed for the day. His goal for today was to meet the new neighbors looking his best. He brushed his hair as best as he could, put on his nice new jeans and shirt and freshly washed jacket. He even put on his new shoes that his grandma had bought him a month ago that he never wore. Besides, meeting the new neighbors was really the only thing he could do today; after grandma had found out what he had been watching despite his best efforts in telling her that he had been channel surfing and just 'happened' to land on that channel, he was banned from watching t.v and working in the garage for three days. He walked down stairs to grab a poptart or something for breakfast when his grandmother saw him.

"Well, if the day ain't long, don't you look handsome today." she said looking him over with a smile, "It's just too bad that it won't last."

"Ah, come on grandma," he said to her opening the fridge, "don't you have even the littlest bit of faith in me that I can actually stay clean?"

"As sure as the devil goes to church."

"Oh, come on grandma," he said closing the fridge, "I'm going to stay nice so I can get a good impression with the new neighbors." He grimaced when he realized he said that last part out loud. His grandma looked daggers at him and said:

"You are not to go there by yourself Wyborne. You goin' for the rent was just a one time deal, and..."

"And it proved that I can be responsible," he said looking up at her, "please grandma, I'm eleven years old, almost twelve. I know that there's some things I still can't do but going over to the Pink Palace by my self is something I can do! I don't know why you wont let me."

"You know why." she said flatly.

"Yeah, I know," he said a little annoyed, "you're twin sister, who you never talk about, disappeared when you two were eight years old."

"And that's why, Wyborne," she said sternly, "that's why."

"But grandma," he said, "it's not like someone would kidnap me if I happened to be within twenty feet of the house." He looked up at her and saw just how serious she had taken that last comment, he could have sworn she had gone a little pale, and looked like she was remembering something not very pleasant. He was expecting to hear her say 'oh that's nonsense' or 'don't you give me no sass' but instead she said:

"That's exactly right Wyborne, and that's why I won't rent it to people with children." He sighed, looking up at her.

"You know, wouldn't be easier to just sit down and tell me everything so I know what's going on?"

"If I did," she said very sadly, looking away from him, "you'd just get curious too, just like she did." she said the last part so softly, he didn't hear it. He did however see the tears forming in her eyes and now he felt bad.

"Hey grandma I'm sorry," he said walking up to her and hugging her, "I didn't mean to upset you." She hugged him back and started to rub his back.

"I know baby, one day I'll tell you." He couldn't help but to roll his eyes, why was it that grown ups always waited to tell you thing important and usually when they did, it wasn't all that important to begin with. Nothing was said between the two for a minute or two, but finally:

"Alright Wyborne," she said letting him go, "you can go meet the new neighbors, just don't go inside....especially that apartment."

"Thanks grandma," he said while with poptart in hand, "I've a few things to get and then I'll leave."

She watched him go upstairs and then walk over to the sink to fill the teapot with water. She thought about what they talked about and knew that part of this was so he could just talk to someone. What made her even sadder however, was she knew that she was part of the reason why he was so lonely. She heard him descend the stairs and saw that he had that horrible mask of his, all neatly cleaned and...

"Oh no," she said turning toward him, "you are not takin' you're school backpack out in those woods! It won't survive the day!"

"Geese grandma, you act like I'm going to burn it or something."

"Knowing you, I wouldn't be half surprised."

"I'm not going out to explore," he said in his defense, "I'm just going over to say 'hello' and then coming right back home."

"Mmm-hmm, and I'm a pekinese gopher."

"Y-You'll see," he said to her, "when I walk in the house just like I am now, you'll flip."

"Wyborne, if you walk into the house still clean," she said walking over to the cupboard to get her tea, "I'll be one surprised woman." He scoffed at her and walked out of the house. He looked over his bike, it wasn't all that bad so it didn't need to be washed. He hopped on it and headed toward the Pink Palace.

* * *

When he reached it, it looked the same as always. He looked to the left, then to the right, hoping to see a car or something, but he didn't. He decided to go for broke and take a peek inside. He walked toward the old porch and was about to step on it when something darted out from the step he was about to step on. He cried out and stumbled backwards, desperately trying to regain his balance, not wanting to fall down and get dirty. When he eventually did, he looked around to see what that thing was, and there sitting on the steps of the house was the black cat looking at him.

"Geez," he said grabbing his jacket where his heart was, "you about knocked me down and gave me a heart attack in the process." The cat did not looked very amused, it's tail swishing from side to side, it's body ridged and stiff and if he didn't know it, he'd swear it was glaring at him.

"All I want to do," he said making his way up the porch, "is look thru the window to see if anyone is home. That's all." He went up to the window and looked inside. The house was dark inside, but he could still see that it was rather grey inside, despite the wallpaper. The house looked like the sort of place that you would love to explore on a dark, creepy night, but not on your own. Despite those observations, the fact still remained that the new renters hadn't arrived yet. Suddenly, he felt the cat climb up his leg and up into his jacket. The cat normally did this whenever it was muddy out and he knew he didn't like getting his feet wet, and he didn't mind, but today was different.

"No," he said first trying to push down the cat, "you get out of there. You can't be in there today, I'm trying to stay relatively clean!" But when the cat reached his abdomen and found his pockets that he would stand in to stay up, the cat hunkered down and refused to move.

"You know w-what," he said opening his jacked a bit to look at the cat, "fine. I guess you c-can stay there, but when the new neighbors come, you got to go." The cat, looking smug like most cats do when they get their way, just snuggled closer once the jacket was closed again. Wybie sighed, he had never seen such a weird cat in all of his life. It was ok though, he decided. It was unnaturally cold this summer, and the cat always acted like a warm fuzzy fanny-pack that would vibrate every now and again.

Wybie looked up at the house and decided that since the new neighbors hadn't arrived yet, he would go home and wait a few hours and try again. He hopped on his bike and started to peddle home, not wanting to get lazy just because he had a motor. On the way home, he looked around at the familiar things of the woods, trying to see if there was anything interesting that he may be able to take a picture with. Not finding anything in particular interest nearby, he started his way home again but, in retrospect, he really didn't want to go home just yet. So changing his mind headed toward the old well.

He reached the old well location and decided just to sit on the old tree stump that was nearby. Dusting it off before sitting down, he looked over to the mushroom fairy ring where the well was and wondered why exactly did they close it off. Thinking about it for only a few moments, he looked toward the Pink Palace and started to think about that. One thought led to another and soon enough, he had come to the conclusion that his grandma was just being overprotective of him.

"You k-know what cat," he said to it, patting it from the outside, "I think grandma said that she had left the house unlocked, so that the renters could go inside if they needed to. M-Maybe," he said taking his gloves off for a moment to scratch an itch on his left hand, "I-I mean it wouldn't hurt just to take a peek inside, now would it?" The cat while he was saying this jumped out of his coat and started to clean it's chest, and as soon as he finished, snatched on of his gloves and ran off.

"Hey! Crazy cat," he called out trying to snatch it, "come back here with my glove!" The cat darted to the woods and Wybie was forced to get onto his bike and chase after it. The cat continued to run deeper into the woods and Wybie was trying his best not to hit any mud puddles or anything like that, but eventually the cat ran up to an old gnarly tree and stopped for a moment, looked over its shoulders and stepped inside of it.

The tree was not unfamiliar to Wybie, it was his 'messing around' tree, one he knew inside and out, literary. The old tree was hollow inside and when he was much younger he would crawl inside and out of the thing, climbing up as high as he could and just whatever he felt like doing. In fact, it was where he first saw the cat several years ago. Wybie got off of his bike and walked up to the tree.

"Come on you psycho," he said calling into the hole at the base of the tree, "I need that glove back. I can't come in and get it from you 'cuz if I did..." Suddenly he could hear fabric ripping from within the tree.

"Don't rip up my glove!" he said and totally forgetting about not getting dirty, got on his hands and knees and squeezed his way inside. It was a tighter fit than the last time he went inside, it had been at least a year ago. He actually had to get off of his knees and army crawl his way inside. Once inside, he pulled out his little flashlight that he always kept with him and looked around for the cat. The cat was near another hole near the base of the tree that led to another larger chamber inside and was on his way toward it. Wybie, without thinking twice, made a daring lunge for the cat and with his free hand snatched the glove from the cat. He held it triumphantly and looked at the cat with the aid of the flashlight and said:

"Ha! Got it back from ya." He put it back on and went to back out when he realized something, he was stuck. Lunging for the cat had successfully wedged himself between the ground and the small hole. He placed his hands on the ground and tried to push himself out while saying through clenched teeth:

"I remember this hole being a little bit bigger last summer." Eventually he freed himself and crawled out of the tree, with some consequences:

His jacket had mud and half decaying leafs and branches caked on it; his jeans were just as muddy same with his shoes and his hair was messed up with twigs and leafs in it as well. He was sure that his face was just a dirty. He groaned and rolled his eyes, looking over to the cat who was sitting on the tree as if he had done nothing wrong.

"Well, thank you for proving my grandma right...again." he said to the cat, who acted that he wasn't even there. He sighed again, walked over to his bike and decided that even if the new neighbors came, there was no way he could present himself looking like this. He jumped on and just as quick, the cat jumped on his shoulders and stood there, wanting a ride home. He started his way home, making it near the Pink Palace when he could see a car approaching from the distance. He knew it had to be the new neighbors, because no one came out this far! He decided that even though he couldn't introduce himself just yet, he would at least see them. He made his way toward the Pink Palace and found a good spot to stash his bike for a moment and a good hiding spot as well. He grabbed his mask and put it on his head and found another spot to hide in. It was perfect, he had a clear view of the front and everything.

He quietly watched a newer model of a grey Volkswagon Beatle with a large dent in the front pull up to the house. A average height woman with black hair opened the driver door and looked around.

"Where are the movers?" she asked her husband who was also stepping out of the car, "I thought that the movers would be here by now."

"Oh I don't know Mel," her husband said with a small smile, "I'm sure that they're just...stuck in traffic."

"What traffic? There was hardly anyone on the roads today." she sighed out and pulled out her cell phone and started to punch in a number. Wybie looked on and was making quiet observations about them. He lowered his mask and quietly as he could, cranked the view to get a closer look at the two. The man was pretty tall, but not as tall as Mr. Bobinsky, and kind of looked like a goof ball. He looked over to the woman again an was quietly noting that she had a neck brace on, when he heard the dad talking agin.

"Well my twitchy-witchy girl, here it is...our new home." he said while opening the door. A girl with blue dyed hair stepped out of the car and looked up at the house.

"This old thing? Are you for real," she said looking at her father, "it looks like it should be condemned."

"WHAT! What do you mean you'll be here tomorrow?!" yelled out the mom at the cell phone, "We needed you to be here today!" As the mom continued to yell and her husband tried to calm her down, Wybie silently made his way closer and closer to the new neighbors, particularly their kid, being silent as a mouse. He was so excited, finally he had someone near his age to talk to! He got as close as he dared to and looked at the new neighbor girl. She was looking at the house as if she would rather throw rocks into the windows than to move inside of it. She looked like she wasn't even happy moving here in the first place.

"Thank you very much." the mom sighed and closed the phone. "Well," she said to her husband, "looks like we're spending the night at a motel Charley."

"Are you sure that they wont be here later," he asked her, "because they have my computer."

"I told you to get a laptop," she sighed to him, "that clunker you have will soon turn into a big paper weight soon."

"Come on kiddo! Time to get into the car again, we're going to a motel tonight." he called out to his daughter. She huffed and did as she was told to do and soon enough they drove away, with the weird neighbor boy watching them with a big smile hidden underneath his mask.


	7. Chapter 7

The next day woke up earlier than he normally would have. He decided to introduce himself to the new neighbor kid today and the excitement he felt rivaled Christmas eve. When he came home the day before, he put his jacket back into the washer to get it cleaned back up; not listening to his grandmother rubbing it in his face that she was right. (He did get a bit of revenge when he hugged her, sharing the mess with her.) He sat up and was ready to spring up and get ready for the day, but he knew that his rushing around would probably wake his grandmother up. He layed back down on the bed and silently waited for at least dawn.

When dawn finally came, he jumped up and ran right for the bathroom to have a shower. While in the shower, his grandmother knocked on the door and poked her head in.

"You, taking a shower, twice in one week? I must have died and gone to heaven during the night."

"Ha-ha." he said.

"So what's the special occasion?" she asked.

"Can't a guy just take a shower in peace and not get asked 20 thousand questions about it?"

"Alright, alright," she sighed and walked out of the bathroom, "breakfast will be ready in ten minutes."

After getting out of the shower and dressing up in not his nicest clothes but his second best, he headed down to the kitchen to eat breakfast. During breakfast, Wybie ate his oatmeal quickly and quietly, deciding not to tell his grandma where he was going. He had come to the conclusion that grandma had rented the middle apartment to the family as a surprise for him, so he didn't want to ruin it for her.

"The weatherman said on the news last night," grandma said after taking a sip of her tea, "that it was going to rain today. The paper says the same, so I don't want you outside all day runnin' around when it does."

"I won't be," he said after rinsing his bowl and putting it in the dirty dish side of the sink, "I'm just going out to do the usual."

"Oh, lost interest in the new renters have you?" said grandma looking up at him.

"No," he said grabbing his mask off the corner of his chair, "I'm going to see if they move in today. And no, I won't go inside the Pink Palace." he said without even giving her the chance to say so.

"Hmm." is all she said.

"I'll be back in a couple of hours." he said while walking out. He went to the garage; hopped on his bike and went out into the woods.

* * *

Several hours went by very slowly for him. Normally there weren't enough hours in the day for him, but today there were just to many. Occasionally, he would check to see if the new renters had moved in yet, but every time he was disappointed. While waiting, he did what he normally did, crawling up trees and under bushes; taking pictures of local wildlife and just using up the day. Around ten o'clock the sky started to get angry looking, and he could hear in the distance thunder rumbling. He sighed, he was running out of time; soon his grandmother would call for him and he would have to go back and have to wait another day. He decided to check one last time before heading back home. He was close to the old orchard where his great-grandfather had planted and farmed apples to sell locally. Now it was only used by people who wanted to come and pick apples for themselves, and that hadn't happened for years. As he was pedaling his way along, he heard someone call out:

"Hello? Who's there?"

Wybie didn't say anything, he stopped peddling for a moment and listened. Nothing was said for a while, so he hopped off his bike and walked it along for a moment until he heard someone scream. He hopped on his bike again and slowly made his way along until he could see the open area of the old well and could see the same girl from the day before yelling at the cat who was on the tree stump. As she was talking to the cat, she mentioned something about a well. That's when he noticed the forked branch in her hands. Now, it did occur to him to walk up normally to her and introduce himself properly, but it wasn't every day when the conditions were just right to give someone you didn't know a good scare. He lowered his mask and quietly positioned himself just right and waited for the right moment. When it came, he honked is air horn and revved the engine and did a wheelie. The weather was on his side, because when he did this, the thunder and lightning had perfect timing. He rode down the hill as if he had been doing it his whole life and did another wheelie. She screamed out and started to swing her branch at him in selfdefence yelling out:

"Get away from me!"

Deciding not to simply turn away or stop, he reached out and grabbed the branch from her and rode past her, pulling her down in the process. After grabbing the branch, he hopped off the bike and walked up on the tree stump and looked down at her using his mask to get a closer look. He could see that she was still freaked out and decided not to continue teasing her. He flipped up the mask and decided to look at her branch.

"Ohh," he said seeing what kind of branch it was and figuring out what it was probably used for, "let me guess, you're from Texas or Utah; someplace dried out and barren, right?" he continued to look at the branch, almost forgetting about the girl.

"I've heard about water-witching before but it doesn't make much sense; I mean it's just an ordinary branch."

"It's a dowsing rod," said the girl, not even trying to cover up her annoyance and anger at him. He then felt a sharp pain in his knee and let go of the branch to grab his knee. As he was jumping up and down the girl continued, "and I don't like be stalked. Not by psycho-nerds or their cats!"

He looked first at the girl and then at the cat who jumped up onto the stump next to him.

"H-He's not really my cat. He's kind of feral you know, wild. O-Of course I do feed him every night and sometimes he'll come in my window 'n bring me little dead things." he said bending down and petting the cat. The girl sighed loudly with annoyance then said:

"Look, I'm from Pontiac." He thought about it for a second and could only think of the car brand.

"Huh?"

"Michigan," she said in a 'duh' tone, "and if I'm a 'water witch', then where's the secret well?" she said stomping the ground within the fairy ring.

"Y-You stomp to hard and you'll fall in itཀ" he said pointing to the ground where she was standing. She cried out and jumped out of the ring. He jumped down and kneeled down by the lit and dug at the mud covering the well's lid, exposing the wood underneath.

"See," he said looking up at her, then knocking at the wood to make the well echo. He stood up and grabbed a large nearby branch and wedged the branch underneath the lid to open it up.

"Supposed to be so deep that if you fell to the bottom and looked up, you'd would see a sky full of stars in the middle of the day." He smiled at her. She looked up at him and her face softened slightly.

"Huh." was all she said. She bent down to feel the lid of the well.

'Well,' Wybie thought, 'so far, so good.' he looked down at the Pink Palace and thought of something else to talk about.

"Surprised she let you move in," he said to her, "my grandma. She owns the Pink Palace. Won't rent to people with kids."

"What do you mean?" she asked, he could hear the disbelief in her voice. He realize what he had said and knew he had to change the subject quickly.

"Wh.....Uh, I'm not supposed to talk about it," he said shrinking back slightly and looking down, not wanting to lie to her right off the bat, "I'm Wybie, Wybie Lovat." he said extending his hand to formally greet her. She took his hand and he vigorously yet limply shook her hand.

"Wybie?" she asked. He knew this part was coming.

"Short for Wyborne," he said walking away from her, "Not my idea, of course. What'd you get saddled with?"

"I wasn't saddled with anything," she said, her annoyance returning, "It's Coraline."

"Caroline what?" he asked, only half-listening to her, the cat had distracted him a little.

"Coraline. Coraline Jones." she said agitated. He did hear her this time, but decided to tease her again.

"Hmm...It's not real scientific, but I heard an ordinary name, like Caroline," he said chasing after the cat and then kneeling down by it, "can lead people to have ordinary expectations about a person." It was the same explanation his grandmother gave him every time he asked her why they decided to name him Wyborne. But he still thought it was cruel of them to do so. He heard her growl from his comment and he was about to say something else when he heard, "Wyborneཀ" called from the distance.

"I think I heard someone calling you, Wyborne." she said the last part with a bit of venom in it.

"W-W-What," he said standing back up with his back towards Coraline, "I-I didn't hear anything."

"Oh I definitely heard someone, Why-were-you-born."

He ignored the insult for a moment, listening for anything. He then heard his grandmother ringing that stupid dinner triangle and calling out his name again.

"Grandma!" he said under his breath and rubbing his hands nervously. He forced some laughter to Coraline while backing away toward his bike. She looked daggers at him. He looked away rubbing his neck, not really knowing how or what to say 'good-bye'.

"Well, great to meet a Michigan water witch," he said bending over to pick up his belongings. Coraline was now taping the branch she had earlier in her hand as if she would like to throw it at him.

"But, I'd wear gloves next time."

"Why?"

" 'Cuz that dousing rod of yours? Uh, it's poison oak." She cried out and dropped the stick. He smirked at her and with a jerk of his head, lowered his mask and rode off back towards home.

* * *

On the way back, he thought about what she had said to him, about his name. Well, he had to admit, no one had ever called him that before. By now, he was use to being called names by Jonas, so it didn't really bother him much. Actually he was surprised no one had called him that before. She was certinatly creative, and perhaps her attitude was because she had moved from so far away. It would sertinatly make him a little adgitatted as well. All in all, he was pleased on how well things went today, it was the first time he had an extended conversation with someone his own age. He pulled up to the house and put his bike away and wipped his feet before entering the kitchen. Grandma was standing in the kitchen waiting for him; she scowled at him then at the window watching the rain start beating down on the glass.

"You better not get no cold from that rain out there," she said looking back at him, "because I'm in no mood to have to waide on you hand an' foot."

"Geez Grandma," he said setting down his mask, "I'm not even wet."

"You are caked in mud," she said looking him up and down, "per-usual."

"You call this caked," he said pointing to himself, "this is nothing. Well, anyway I'll get in the tub then."

"Hold on Wyborne," she said shuffilng into the living room, "I need you to do something for me first. That's why I called you."

"What" he asked following her into the living room.

"I need you to go up into the attic and dust up there for me," she said pointing up the stairs and at the attic doorway, "I'd have done it myself but I'm not as young as I use to be. My hips wont let me up those silly steps today." Normally, any kid would eaither whine and complain or be afraid to go up, but Wybie almost jumped at the idea. He had always wanted to go up into the attic and look around to see what was there, but his grandma always said he was too little to go up there.

"Sure thing grandma," he said almost flying up the stairs in his hurry. She called him back and he grabbed the little hand-held dust buster and broom and dustpan and went back up the stairs. The attics' door handle was still way up high for him, so he used the broom's handle to jimmy the door open and pulled the ladder down. He climbed the steps and reaching inside of his coat pulled out his little flashlight and had a look around. The attic was very much like Mr. Bobinskies appartment, as in that the roof was low, there were lots of things that he wanted to see and there was a musty smell in the air that mixed with dust. He stepped up and walked a little ways in, looking at the boxes and thing covered in sheets. He looked up and found the dangling light and pulled the string. The light bulb took it's time to light up. It was an older bulb, probably from the forties or fifties he wasn't sure. The old bulb casted a deep yellowish light inside the attic that matched the mood of the attic. He really wanted to open all of the boxes and just explore every last corner of the attic, but he decided he'd better get going at dusting.

After sweeping and dusting for about half an hour, he decided he'd take a break. He went to go down into the kitchen and make a sandwitch or something when he heard a scratching noise. He paused for a moment, but then decided it was nothing and continued downstairs. Grandma was in her chair watching a talk show on tv and only looked up at him for a moment.

"Taking a break, grandma." he said walking into the kitchen.

"Alright Wyborne." she said turning back to her show. He entered the kitchen and made himself a nice BLT sandwitch with ham, chicken, tuna mixed with mayo and cheese, beets and mashed potatos and was about to take the first bite when he heard his grandma cry out in terror.

"OHཀ Wyborneཀ Come quickཀ" He set his sandwitch down and ran into the livingroom and saw his grandmother curled up into her chair, holding her legs wit one hand and pointing with the other underneath the older armchair with the lace on it.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"A ratཀ" she called out, arm still outstretched and pointing to the chair; quivering in terror, "There's a rat underneath the chairཀ I saw it go underཀ Oh, Oh,Ohཀ Ugly, nasty, filthy thingsཀ"

"I'll get it." he said grabbing a towel from the fridge and walking over to the chair.

"Oh, be careful Wyborneཀ" she wailed, "don't let it bite youཀ"

"I won't." he said and pulling out his flashlight again, he looked underneath the lace of the chair and turned it on. Underneath the chair in the corner was a little creature too small to be a rat, in fact it was a mouse.

"It's only a mouse." he said to her looking up at her. None the less, she still squealed and covered her face with her hands. He shook his head and looked back at the mouse to grab it but then it jumped out from the chair and hopped away. Grandma cried out in terror and wailing:

"Get it, get it, get itཀ" He chased the mouse around the living room and up the stairs, noticing that it wasn't an orinary mouse, but rather like a kangaroo mouse that he had seen on television on that animal show. He didn't think too hard about it though, as he was trying to catch the thing. As it hopped up the stairs he thought to himself where was that cat when you needed him. He reached the top of the stairs when he lost sight of it. He looked around, but didn't see where it could have gone too. Then he heard a squeeking sound above him and saw a tail just disappear from sight in the attic doorway. He went back up into the attic and saw it enter a small hole inside of an old hope chest that was sitting in the back of the attic.

"Must be it's nest." he said to himself and went over to the chest.

"Did you get it?ཀ" called out his histaricle grandmother.

"Not yet," he yelled out, "it went inside a old chest up here, I think it's where it's nesting." he heard his grandmother wail in terror at the thought that the mouse may have been living there for some time. He went over to the chest and went to open it but it was locked with an old fashioned lock that required a skeleton key. He looked around to see if there was anything he could use to open it, but as luck would have it, there on one of the main support beams was an old set of skeleton keys on a nail.

He hopped on a box and got the keys down and one by one tried each key until the right one opened the lock. He put another box in front of the hole to make sure that the mouse would not excape, then placed one ear to the side of the chest trying to hear it to make sure it was still inside. He could hear it squeeking so he opened the chest and had a look. Inside were old fashoned girls dresses and shose that looked like they were for younger children. He moved things around and saw more and more young girl things like toys and old books of 'Dick and Jane' and other old things. The smell coming out of the box smelled old and unmoved, of an gone time that would soon be forgotten again once the box was closed. Finally, he thought he found it, and he raised his hand quietly up into the air and snatched it with his hand and went to put it inside the towel he had broght with him, but then he realized it wasn't a real mouse he had grabbed. It was a little doll kangaroo mouse with rosey cheeks and little black button eyes. He set it back into the chest and contiued looking for the real mouse when he saw it. Underneath everything, wrapped inside what looked like a baby blanket was a old doll, that looked uncanilly like Coraline.

He picked it up and had a closer look at it. It was an older doll, dirty and warn in some places, so it couldn't have been made resently. It had a raincoat on and blue hair, just like Coraline as well as her freakles. He raised his eyebrows, why on earth was there a doll that looked like the new neighbor kid inside his grandmothers trunk that probably hadn't been open since World War 2.

"Did you find it yet?" called out grandma. He looked down at the hole and said:

"Not yetཀ" he set down the doll and continued to look for the mouse, but it wasn't inside at all, and there wasn't anyway for it to escape otherwise. He huffed through his nose and looked at the old Coraline doll and desided to do something he had never done before. He put the doll inside of his coat, closed the lid of the trunk and went back downstairs and pretended to have the mouse in his hands.

"I-I-I g-got it, g-grandm-ma." he stuttered out, not really use to lying to her. She sqwealed out in panic, but still opened the door for him to let it out.

"Take it far from the houseཀ Make sure it don't come backཀ"

"I w-will." he said and ran out into the rain far out of sight of the house. Then he just stood there for a moment, and then ran back into the house. When he came into the house, his grandma was running around getting the vacume cleaner out and a can of disinfectent to clean the living room with.

"Horrible, nasty, desease ridden things," she was saying to herself, "hope we don't get sick from that discustin' thing." she looked up at him.

"Wyborne, give me your coat and gloves. I'm goin' to wash them to get any germs off of them." Wybie tried to think of something to say, to not give her the coat that had the doll inside of the pocket.

"Wh-w-well...uh, g-grandma. I-I'll j-just..." she lowered her hand and looked dagers at him.

"You didn't put that thing in your pocket now did you, 'cuz if you did Wyborne,"

"No, no of course not," he said, "I w-was just going to say that...uh, that I was going to get ready to get into the tub and wash up." he looked at her, hoping she wouln't find anything suspishious about it. She looked at him and then at the attic opeining.

"Before you do, close that attic door. You can finish dusting later on in the week." He nodded and did what he was told to do. He went into his room and closed the door and quickly pulled out the doll and hid it inside his clean clothes in his drawrs, knowing she wouldn't go looking in there. He then got some clean clothes and went into the bathroom to have a bath.

Later that night, after he and his grandmother went to bed, he got up and went to the dresser and pulled out the doll. He went back to bed with the doll in his hands and studied it. He was trying to figure out what where the odds of a doll that was made probably seventy years ago would look like a person in the present day. He then thought of a brilliant idea. He was sure that his grandma had forgotten all about the doll, heck she couldn't even go up the ladder anymore to the attic. It wasn't like she would find out anytime soon. And since it looked so much like Coraline; perhaps he could give her the doll and perhaps in the process get a friend in return. Atleast it was worth a shot, what could possibly go wrong.

* * *

**Sorry for the long break of the story. Hope you all enjoyed the chapter! **


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